A PROTEST IS planned against the Hoxton Hotel in Dublin after it sought an injunction against the popular nightlife spot Yamamori Izakaya due to noise levels.

On Friday, the hotel said the two sides have agreed to work on sound testing together over the weekend in order to come to a solution. 

The Hoxton Hotel, formerly the Central Hotel on Exchequer St, opened in November after refurbishment works and adjoins Yamamori Izakaya, a restaurant and bar where live music is played five nights a week. 

A spokesperson for the hotel told The Journal that it sought to “engage constructively with Yamamori Izakaya since late November to conduct joint acoustic testing” and that “testing has not yet been facilitated by Yamamori Izakaya”.

They added that the Hoxton had been left with “no choice but to seek this injunction”.

The move was met with outrage by many people online and a protest has been organised for tomorrow evening.

Speaking to Newstalk, Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin, a musician and People Before Profit member, said that the protest is taking place “because people are sick of the loss of cultural space venues in the city”.

“They see with the threat of this injunction that they could lose a very important venue for the nightlife of the city,” he added.

The Hoxton Hotel has said that noise levels have led to multiple complaints from guests and that the hotel cannot offer a quarter of its rooms as a result.

But Ó Ceannabháin said that Yamamori Izakaya “has been there for a lot longer than the new management at the Hoxton”.

He also pointed to the Dublin City Council development plan.

“It says that all applications for short or longer-term residential proposals, including hotels, that seek permission adjacent to established late night users, such as nightclubs, shall be required to demonstrate in their application that they have ensured their development will not cause negative impacts on the adjoining uses in the future.

“So that basically puts the onus on the newcomer to basically make sure that they’re not going to have this kind of retrospective ‘nimbyism’ when it comes to existing nightclubs and venues.”

-With additional reporting from David MacRedmond